Happy Income Tax Day!
Let me tell you about Mary R. Back in the 1970s, she was a single mother with no job skills to speak of. Poor planning? No, her husband had been shot to death.
Mary R. went on welfare. While on welfare, she went to college and got a degree in computer science. (I'm not sure you can do this any more. I think that President Clinton's welfare "reform" makes it difficult or impossible to stay on welfare for four years.) After she graduated, Mary got a succession of well-paying jobs in Silicon Valley. She and I worked together for a couple of years at a small Silicon Valley startup, which is where she told me this story. Last I heard, Mary was a successful manager at Intel. Through her income taxes, she has repaid the government many times over for its investment in her.
Thanks to all the taxpayers who, forty years ago, made Mary R.'s success possible, and to all the taxpayers today whose taxes are improving the productivity of American workers and creating more successful careers. We taxpayers rock!
I could as easily have written about horrible things the government does with our money. For me, our invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan fall in that category; YMMV. But I think that the remedy when our government ****s up is not to pay less in taxes, but to learn from our mistakes and elect better leaders. It seems to me that government is essential to just about everything we do; any well-functioning market economy is the child of government. For examples of market economies without government intervention, see Zimbabwe or Somalia. For an example of what happens when the government protects business owners but not employees or consumers, see Qatar.
(None of this means that I enjoy the paperwork involved in filing our income taxes. This year, we're taking an extension.)
Also see Thanks to the taxpayers who made my life possible and "It takes taxes... to raise a child".
Mary R. went on welfare. While on welfare, she went to college and got a degree in computer science. (I'm not sure you can do this any more. I think that President Clinton's welfare "reform" makes it difficult or impossible to stay on welfare for four years.) After she graduated, Mary got a succession of well-paying jobs in Silicon Valley. She and I worked together for a couple of years at a small Silicon Valley startup, which is where she told me this story. Last I heard, Mary was a successful manager at Intel. Through her income taxes, she has repaid the government many times over for its investment in her.
Thanks to all the taxpayers who, forty years ago, made Mary R.'s success possible, and to all the taxpayers today whose taxes are improving the productivity of American workers and creating more successful careers. We taxpayers rock!
I could as easily have written about horrible things the government does with our money. For me, our invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan fall in that category; YMMV. But I think that the remedy when our government ****s up is not to pay less in taxes, but to learn from our mistakes and elect better leaders. It seems to me that government is essential to just about everything we do; any well-functioning market economy is the child of government. For examples of market economies without government intervention, see Zimbabwe or Somalia. For an example of what happens when the government protects business owners but not employees or consumers, see Qatar.
(None of this means that I enjoy the paperwork involved in filing our income taxes. This year, we're taking an extension.)
Also see Thanks to the taxpayers who made my life possible and "It takes taxes... to raise a child".